How are these old racist ideas communicated to our society today?
Related questions
Question
How are these old racist ideas communicated to our society today?
Transcribed Image Text:For one thing 500 years of European control
of the world has left some parts of our planet highly
developed, and other parts desperately poor and
weak. First Nations peoples are still dispossessed.
Other people of colour live the cumulative effects of
hundreds of years of discrimination, exploitation and
marginalization. Such dramatic inequalities are easily
explained by attributing them to different "racial"
characteristics. Anger and mistrust have been
learned and passed on. Assumptions about who
belongs, and what different people are like, formed
during a period when racial inequality was taken for
granted have become deeply ingrained. A large part
of Western culture, literature and art also reflects
these assumptions. As a result of this history certain
groups of white Canadians still enjoy power and
privileges denied to others. No matter how we
personally feel about it, our "race" still affects our
lives and our relationships with others. We live with
the results of our history.
Racism is also, tragically, useful. A racial
name can still put someone "in their place" in a
moment of conflict. Discrimination and privilege can
still be justified. Pools of cheap labour provided by
marginalized groups guarantee the profitability of
entire industries.
Different groups of people can still be divided,
manipulated and set against each other by recourse
to racial stereotypes and identifications. Once
fashioned, racism has become a weapon that all
sorts of people can pick up and use for their own
purposes. It is a weapon that will not easily be
thrown away.
Our responsibility then is not to be paralysed,
either by anger or by guilt, over the injustices of
history. We must remember those injustices. We
must understand them. And most important of all,
we must use those memories and understandings as
a tool to dismantle their tragic legacy today.
Transcribed Image Text:The End of Colonialism--The End of Racism?
It was the defeat of the Nazis that spelled the
end of European colonial power. The allies needed
help from their colonies to defeat Germany, and that
tended to strengthen the hand of their colonial
subjects who were demanding independence. If
Britain, France and America had to publicly proclaim
that racism was a crime, and that all people were
really equal, then how could colonialism be
defended? As well, the evidence of the horrors,
which were the logical outcome of racist ideas were
evidenced once again in the holocaust. And this time
that evidence was at home in Europe and not in
some far distant colony that was easily ignored.
In some places the Europeans left their
colonies peacefully, safeguarding their interests with
negotiated independence. In other places they had
to be thrown out through insurrection and
anti-colonial wars. But all over the world, the
so-called "lesser races" regained their humanity and
independence, and with the destruction of
colonialism, international law condemned racism as a
crime against humanity.
With the war over, UNESCO gathered
together prominent scientists from around the world
to draft an official position on race. The 1950
declaration presented four premises: the mental
capacities of all races are similar, there is no
evidence for biological deterioration as a result of
hybridization ("race mixing"), there is no correlation
between national or religious groups and any race
(race does not produce culture), and finally "race is
less a biological fact than a social myth." (Barkan,
1992, p 341)
Today, even the last bastion of European race
theory and practice, the white settler state of South
Africa, is finally engaged in an historic
transformation.
So why is the fight against racism in Canada
still so difficult and complicated? If the conditions
and interests that led to the development of racist
ideas are quickly passing away won't these ideas
soon just fade like some long forgotten superstition?
For one thing 500 years of European control
of the world has left some parts of our planet highly
developed, and other parts desperately poor and
Expert Solution
This question has been solved!
Explore an expertly crafted, step-by-step solution for a thorough understanding of key concepts.
Step by step
Solved in 4 steps
